'No solution' for Indian Village flood damage

Big Thompson stalwart too devastated to rebuild, owners say

By Alex Burness Reporter-Herald Staff Writer

Posted:
12/11/2013 09:26:40 AM MST

With his home that was destroyed by the flood in the background, Howard Carman talks Tuesday about the damage to his home and business in the Big Thompson Canyon. Carman and his wife Lena own the Big Thompson Indian Village store that was washed away by flood waters in September.
(
Lilia Munoz
)

Howard and Lena Carman have owned and operated the Big Thompson Indian Village gift shop for more than four decades. Time and again, they've traversed the western United States, amassing a collection of Native American jewelry, pottery and other items worth more than $1 million in total. They lived in a house adjacent to the store, and Howard worked for years designing a backyard park that would eventually play host to several weddings and hundreds of photo ops for passing families.

Today, the Carmans' nearly two-acre property is beyond recognition. Thanks to September flooding, their shop and home now lay in a pile of lumber mere feet from the lower Big Thompson Canyon stretch of U.S. 34, and Howard's beloved park is a jumble of silt, debris and boulders.

Like so many flood victims in the canyon, the Carmans aren't exaggerating when they say they lost everything. But unlike many of their neighbors, the couple has no recovery plan. They're both in their mid-60s, and say they're too emotionally drained to pick up the pieces of a life they spend 43 years building.

"I don't know what we're going to do," Howard says. "There isn't any solution. Nothing was insured. It's something that we just will not be able to solve."

After the flood, the Carmans bought a used trailer and relocated to Kelim -- "And we don't even have a place to park the damn thing" -- but they're likely to move in soon with Lena's family in Cortez. The couple that scoured 11 states to find the eventual Indian Village site must now start from scratch.

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"That was our retirement. Now we have a little bit of Social Security, and we probably have to go work in some different places," Howard says.

Indian Village was a gem not only in the Carmans' minds, but also in those of thousands of tourists who'd drive by it every year. The store boasted authentic goods, expertly curated by owners who fancy themselves more specialists than mere vendors. After all, they spent two years on Native American reservations in Arizona and New Mexico, honing craft-making skills and sharpening their collectors' eyes.

The Big Thompson Indian Village was a well known landmark before being washed away in the September flooding.
(Special to the Reporter-Herald)

"We had a lot of people come in and say that ours was the closest they'd seen to the trading posts that used to be along Route 66," Lena says.

Adds Howard: "In the 40-some years that we were in here, hundreds of times people came in on vacation and said it was the best store they'd been in on their whole trip. Everybody that stopped left with something. I mean, we had three generations come back and take their pictures in the back."

The unfortunate flip side of staying in business so long is that the couple's current plight is an all-too-familiar one. They've spent enough time in the canyon to have faced nearly the same mess after the 1976 Big Thompson flood. That disaster devastated their property, and business suffered mightily during the subsequent four years it took to rebuild U.S. 34.

"I can't start over again," Howard says. "I did it when I was 25. I rebuilt everything. But not again."

After the 1976 flood, he adds, "we never, ever thought that there'd be any water that would get up near the store again. We'd done everything we could do to channel the water away from us and make sure we'd never see that problem again."

Though the Carmans aren't moving back to the canyon anytime soon, and have all but ruled out a total rebuild of their property, Howard says he hopes to see Indian Village at least partially restored come spring. The couple is rallying support at its website, bigthompsonindianvillage.webs.com.

"I would like to see something done with the property where people could all use it and enjoy it again. Where it's not left in shambles. This needs to be cleaned up, and not just something like a martyr where people stop and take pictures," he says. "Let's get this thing fixed."